Amtrak

Amtrak celebrates National Train Day Saturday with festivities across the country, including Chicago’s Union Station, 210 South Canal St., from 11 a.m.-4 p.m. In addition to some live entertainment, kids might enjoy getting up close to some interesting rolling stock, including some historic train cars and privately owned coaches. It might be a good time to gauge whether your kids are interested in rail travel. What's more, if parents book by the end of Friday, their kids up to age 15 can travel Amtrak free...

BOSTON (Reuters) - A 56-year-old man was struck and killed by an Amtrak train in Connecticut on Monday morning, the second such fatality in the area in recent weeks, authorities said. The victim, whose name has not be released, was walking on the tracks when he was struck in Groton, Connecticut, around 9:00 a.m. and thrown into the nearby Mystic River by an Acela Express train traveling to Boston from New York. Groton Police Lieutenant John Varone said the man was 56 years...

I was shocked by Amtrak's announcement last week that boarding passengers will now face random screening of their carry-on bags in an effort to detect explosives. Shocked, not because our passenger rail system is risking delays and customer irritation by tightening security measures. But because the move is being made proactively, before some terrorist or nut-job lugs a bomb on board a U.S. train and wreaks the sort of havoc already seen on trains around the world. Our typical pattern...

There's a new way to train your dog, and it has nothing to do with obedience school. Amtrak on Monday announced a six-month pilot project to allow small dogs and cats aboard its trains between Chicago and Quincy. The furry traveling companions won't get a seat, but their owners will have to pay $25, officials said. The test is a partnership with the Illinois Department of Transportation and will run from May 5 through Nov. 2, officials said. The results of the...

Long-sought plans to restore passenger rail service next year between Chicago and Rockford got a boost Thursday with the announcement of a new route. Service between the two cities stopped in 1981. The new Amtrak service will begin in late 2015 with one roundtrip daily between Union Station and a temporary 7th Street station in Rockford, according to the Illinois Department of Transportation. A permanent Main Street station along the Rock River in Rockford...

Have your editorial writer try to make a few cross-country trips via Greyhound. For those of us who cannot afford to or do not want to fly, that is the only choice other than Amtrak. In October 2000 I spent 12 hours in Greyhound's sorry excuse for a Chicago station trying to get to San Diego. I gave up and took Amtrak. Try leaving the driving to Greyhound before you conclude there is no need for Amtrak.

Inspiration can be found in surprising places, even on a train, where thoughts of greatness are free to gush from the brain. Officials at Amtrak , which is more versed in delays than in Dickens, nevertheless believe that the clicketyclack of tracks and fingers tapping on keyboards are a perfect match. (And not a bad marketing tool either.) The government-funded national passenger railroad has launched the Amtrak Writer's Residency. Storytellers and aspiring writers from...

Many people will never take to the skies again, fearing flying on an airplane is too dangerous. Many people took to riding the rails on Amtrak, and found a viable, comfortable alternative. If we can find funding for highways and airlines, why can't we find adequate funding to keep Amtrak alive?

Amtrak trains operating in Chicago and across the Midwest have slogged through numerous delays and cancellations this winter, a problem fueled not only by unusually heavy snow and frigid temperatures but also, oddly, the unintended consequences of rolling out Wi-Fi Internet service. The passenger railroad's on-time performance plummeted to around 26 percent on one Illinois run in January. Overall for the month, less than half of the state service operated on schedule, Amtrak data show.

It's easy for Tribune columnists Steve Chapman and Eric Zorn to advocate killing Amtrak when they have O'Hare International Airport next-door. It's not so easy if you live in or have to travel to dozens of communities nationwide that lack airline service and may take a series of bus connections to find. They're right about Amtrak service being lackluster at times. The congressionally mandated goal of self-sufficiency has hamstrung its attempts to improve service. The tragedy of Sept.

A woman was injured this afternoon after the station wagon she was driving was struck by an outbound Amtrak train in West Suburban Riverside, police said. The accident happened at 2:39 p.m. at the grade crossing on Harlem Avenue, said Riverside Police Chief Tom Weitzel. The woman was southbound on Harlem Avenue and was stuck in traffic and was trapped on the tracks said Weitzel. After the vehicle was on the tracks the crossing gates went down on the...

My wife and I and a handicapped adult have enjoyed several trips to the West Coast in the past six years using Amtrak's combination of train travel one way and return by air. We have found Amtrak accommodations and service very satisfactory, particularly for the handicapped passenger. We have met several foreign tourists on these trips who regard train travel as the best way to see the U.S. In my opinion, Amtrak is a valuable resource that deserves to be fully subsidized by Congress.

Amtrak announced a modified schedule Saturday afternoon in preparation for the extreme cold predicted to hit the region Monday. The modified schedules will affect Amtrak's Chicago Hub Services as some trains will be canceled on a precautionary basis to maintain service on all routes. Passengers are asked to use caution on their way to and from stations and to expect delays Monday, said an Amtrak service alert. The following trains will not be running Monday: Lincoln...

As someone who has been employed in the rail industry for more than 30 years, I found your Feb. 16 editorial on eliminating funding for Amtrak without context to the realities of the creation of Amtrak and the financial hurdles a rail operation, particularly passenger service, must overcome. The dream of operating a profitable rail passenger service is impossible if the amortization of capital costs is included. This was true when Amtrak was created; it is true now. The term "profit" was interjected to...

More than 500 passengers spent the night aboard three Amtrak trains stranded 80 miles west of Chicago by ice and snow that had drifted over the tracks, officials said. The trains -- the Southwest Chief from Los Angeles, the Illinois Zephyr from Quincy and the California Zephyr from the San Francisco Bay area -- were halted around 5 p.m. Monday near Mendota, according to Amtrak spokesman Marc Magliari. This morning, Amtrak began moving passengers on two of the trains...

Letters to the editor from Naperville, Lombard, Batavia, Aurora and La Grange Park. Thoughtless tribute This is in response to "Naperville train crash memorial in the works; Sculpture would be tribute to victims of 1946 tragedy" (News, Dec. 1). When I saw the proposed sculpture for the east end of the Naperville station platform, I was genuinely surprised. I don't disagree that a suitable memorial should be made, perhaps a large stone with plaque describing the event. But to have this...

A Detroit-bound train from Chicago made it a couple miles outside the station before it stopped for six hours because of an equipment problem. The train was supposed to leave at 6 p.m. but departed about 6:35 p.m. The crew noticed a "flat spot" on one of the wheels "several miles" out of the station, said spokesman Steve Kulm. Amtrak spokesman Marc Magliari described a flat spot as a place on the wheel that “stops being round. " “It happens from time to time...